Opinion

The Immigration Debate in the Cesspool of Orange County

by Miles Clements

We all saw the pictures and heard the stories of the thousands of flag-waving protestors that filed through the streets of Santa Ana. We also saw the pictures of the city’s finest watching over them with a careful eye and an armory of riot gear. Propelled by House Resolution 4437, a bill aimed at drastically curbing illegal immigration, the protestors ultimately led largely peaceful demonstrations that resulted in only a handful of minor arrests. But outside the streets and on the airwaves, the debate over illegal immigration has become a bitter war.

Gustavo Arellano, OC Weekly’s resident Mexican and recent Fox News guest, feels that “what little dialogue there was is now [just] a screaming match on both sides.” And rightly so. In what can only be described as a brutally hilarious and insightful moment in punditry, CNN’s Lou Dobbs, locked in an argument with La Raza’s Janet Murguia, passionately proclaimed that he doesn’t “think that we should have any flag flying in this country except the flag of the United States” and that he doesn’t care who you are, that “there shouldn’t even be a St. Patrick’s Day.” Then there’s Tom Tancredo, a Republican Congressman from Colorado and Italian-American, who went on record stating that he considers illegal immigrants a “scourge.” It seems that for Congressman Tancredo, irony, not revolution, is the ecstasy of history.

But what does all of this say about Orange County? Well, not much that hasn’t already been said. After all, Orange County has been an epicenter for anti-immigration fervor for awhile now, with special attention being paid to Jim Gilchrist and his Minutemen Project. If anything, it seems that the nation is simply co-opting Orange County’s ongoing racial tensions and projecting them onto a much larger stage.

For a small, 789 square-mile chunk of land known for its overflowing wealth and dense, prefab communities, Orange County is nowhere near as sterile and as some may believe. Bordering on a population of three million people, roughly 65% of the county’s citizens identify themselves as being white, with 30% of its inhabitants identifying themselves as Latino or Hispanic and 14% identifying themselves as Asian or Pacific Islander. While 30% is certainly not a shockingly large number for the county’s largest minority, it is on par with the rest of California and is not terribly far off from LA County. But the difference between Orange County and some other areas of the state is that so many members of the county’s minority populations are being relegated to invisible jobs in marginalized towns, like Anaheim and Santa Ana, with the latter’s population of nearly 350,000 being 76% Hispanic. It’s not surprising, then, that Orange County has fostered its fenced-off, bleach-blonde stereotype; that’s all that the county seems to want to be.

That’s where Gustavo Arellano’s column, the wildly popular “Ask a Mexican,” enters. “Ask a Mexican” invites its readers to bring forth any and all their Mexican-related questions, which have ranged from “It’s long been a stereotype that Mexicans are lazy and shiftless. Could that be why you have problems answering my questions?” to “Why do Mexicans spit everywhere?” Responding with almost a cold calculation, Arellano answers the questions with a wry sense of humor and a sharp wit, often making his way into cryptic or etymological histories. The result is an ultimately intelligent debate that brings forth the county’s primary minority voice in a way that both eases and confronts any hidden racial tension. “More than a safety valve, ‘Ask a Mexican’ is an indictment of the gabacho mind,” Arellano explains. “The fact that this column exists truly is a joke—really, what does it say about our society that a column that answers readers’ questions about Mexicans exists?” Yet all joking aside, Arellano notes there is something to be said about the power of “debunking and exploding” these stereotypes and myths.

What, though, does “Ask a Mexican” really say about our county? Well, it reminds us that we aren’t living in a homogeneous and white-plastered world. There are people who are continually questioned and ridiculed, people who are shifted out of the mainstream and out of the public eye. Beneath the multi-million dollar homes and classic suburban sprawl, there is and has almost always been a mass of people who literally run the county. While the poignancy of the immigration protests and “Ask a Mexican” are clear, they should not be the only events that force us to think about what Orange County is and is becoming. But that also doesn’t mean that there should be a shouting match or ridiculous name calling. As Gustavo Arellano quips about his television experiences, “It’s as if they expect me to come out with machetes gleaming. But it’s better to win your arguments by their strength rather than ad hominems.” And Arellano couldn’t be more right.

For more information visit:
U.S. Census Bureau data
“Ask a Mexican”